Home > Home Theater Design & Setup
Are You Finally Building Your Own Home Theater?
Avoid Costly Mistakes And Maximize Your Viewing Enjoyment
With The Proper Home Theater Design & Room Setup
Are you in the planning process of building your own home theater room? Are you
trying to figure out how to design and setup everything together to get the best results? It can be somewhat intimidating considering
all the things that need to be done... from proper wiring and installation to speaker placement, room acoustics and even the kind of lighting to
use. On top of that, technology is constantly changing. You need to be up to speed with what's going on in order to have all the necessary audio
/ video components that will serve you well not just today, but many years down the road.
It would be a shame to spend thousands of dollars and not have your system sound as good as it can or your video display not
looking as sharp as it can because you didn't know a few simple rules about proper home theater design & layout. But don't
panic, it's doesn't have to be a hard and confusing process.
A few Home Theater Design Tips:
By simply learning a few things, you could save yourself a lot of time and money and make this a truly fun experience
- as it should be.
Acoustics:
The shape of the room will play a role on how sound will travel. Ideally, if it's possible, try to avoid square rooms when choosing the
location of your home theatre. A rectangular shape would be better (but not too long and narrow either). If you have the space, you
might consider placing a small partition to re-shape the room to get the maximum effect.
Sound will bounce off hard surfaces such as concrete and wood and will create an echoing effect. That's why you should add carpeting in your
room to absorb some of that sound. You should also consider adding curtains. They will not only help balance the acoustics, they will also block
off any light that might be coming through a window. As a bonus, a nice curtain will also add pizzazz to your room.
TV Screen Size:
You don't want to buy a television that's too big or too small for your space. The best way to figure out the ideal size is to first plan your
seating arrangement. Once you know that, measure the distance between the closest seat and where the tv screen would be. As a
rough guideline, the width of your screen should be no more than half that distance you just measured between the seat and the
screen.
Speaker Placement:
If you purchase a 5.1 surround sound system, you will get 5 speakers. Ideally, the 2 front speakers should be at ear level and at equal
distance at either side of the screen. The center speaker should be behind or below the video display depending on what that is
(projector screen, or flat panel tv, etc.). The Rear speakers, should be about 3 feet above and a bit behind of the furthest seat
back on either side of the room. If that's not possible, consider mounting them on the ceiling.
Home Theater Wiring:
Of course, you want to minimize or completely avoid seeing any wires. If you're building your own theater room from scratch, you
can try to hide all the wiring in the walls. Otherwise, you may want to hide your wires under a carpet possibly making a little cut in
the underlay to avoid bumps and using tubing to conceal all the wiring and connections.
Lighting:
You want to avoid having bright lights. I suggest using a dimmer, or having a subtle mood light. This will help create the
ambience and will not put any strain on your eyes.
Recommendation:
Once you have your home cinema set up, it will be one of the focal points of your house. It will be a place where family and friends
will gather and great memories will be created. An area that you will be proud to show off and will enjoy for a long time. That's why it's
so important to spend that little bit of extra time in the beginning ensuring that you're building your own home theater correctly. Even if
you're not doing it yourself and getting professional advise or installation, by understanding what's going on you can make sure that
everything is on track.
You could have the best system in the world, but by not knowing simple things like speaker placement, how room
acoustics work and how you can capitalize on that, you will not get the full impact your system can deliver. That's why proper Home
Theater design & setup is crucial to maximize your enjoyment of your home cinema.
To learn what you need to do and get when building your own home theater room or to simply learn how to take full advantage of your room's
layout, I highly recommend you read the Home Theater Design eBook. It's a very small investment that will arm you with the knowledge to make the right
decisions.
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